Despite a large body of work in films, TV, theatre and concerts, I am viewed by many as a Jewish artist. I do not resent the label, except for the fa….

You always draw on your experiences with live audiences to know how to do comedy on films. You're working for a laugh that may or may not come six mo….

I am determined to give the Yiddish language a fighting chance to survive..

What moves me is neither ethnocentric pride nor sectarian arrogance. I make no claim that Jewish culture is superior to other cultures. But it is min….

I glory in the fact that a human being has multiple talents and exercises them all with a degree of integrity and artistic proficiency. That's what I….

We live in a world of guns, bombs and terror. To conquer hate seems a nigh-impossible task..

I don't speak out because I am an actor nor will I keep silent because I am an actor. I respect my profession, but it endows me with no special privi….

I have always striven to raise the voice of hope for a world where hate gives way to respect and oppression to liberation..

Throughout my life I have cared as deeply about the songs of all peoples as I have about the rights of all peoples..

Epistemology is the study of knowledge. By what conduit do we know what we know?.

By showing hunger, deprivation, starvation and brutality, as well as endurance and nobility, documentaries inform, prod our memories, even stir us to….

One might have thought the world would stop ascribing moral equivalence between acts of terrorism and acts of punishing terrorism. It has not happene….

I am a universalist, passionately devoted to the cause of equality within the human family..

All too often arrogance accompanies strength, and we must never assume that justice is on the side of the strong. The use of power must always be acc….

I prefer to make common cause with those whose weapons are guitars, banjos, fiddles and words..

I always sang, I always acted, I always played..

No heirloom of humankind captures the past as do art and language..

No doubt unity is something to be desired, to be striven for, but it cannot be willed into being by mere declarations..

In my world, history comes down to language and art. No one cares much about what battles were fought, who won them and who lost them - unless there ….

I tried for a while to be an agricultural worker and was hopelessly bored. To me it was meaningless. I would stand around in heaps of manure and sing….

I know for certain of only one commandment, one obligation, that God imposes upon us, and that is to be compassionate toward other human beings..